Midwest Premiere
"In the Realms of the Unreal: The Mystery of Henry Darger"
A Film by Academy Award ® Winner Jessica Yu - Produced by Sue West

Thursday January 13, 2005

Press Release:
Intuit: The Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art and the Gene Siskel Film Center of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago will present the Chicago area premiere and sneak preview of In the Realms of the Unreal: The Mystery of Henry Darger, a documentary by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Jessica Yu. The film will screen on Thursday, January 13 at 8:15 p.m. at the Gene Siskel Film Center, located at 164 North State Street in downtown Chicago. The evening will include post-show discussion session with the filmmaker Jessica Yu and a dessert reception. -

Tickets are $45 to the public and can be purchased through Ticketmaster at 312.575-8000, online at http://www.ticketmaster.com, or in person at the Gene Siskel Film Center box office. Intuit and Film Center members' tickets are $35 and must be purchased at the Gene Siskel Film Center box office. The box office opens at 5pm Monday through Friday and 2pm weekends.

In The Realms of the Unreal The Mystery of Henry Darger is one of 12 films shortlisted for the 2005 Academy Award ® for Best Documentary. It also is nominated for Best Documentary of the Year by the IFP Gotham Awards. It won the prestigious Best Documentary at the Vancouver Film Festival and Ojai Film Festivals and Best Editing at the Atlanta Film Festival. The film was an official selection of the Sundance, Seattle and London Film Festivals as well.

In the Realms of the Unreal is the culmination of five years of intense research into the life and work of Henry J. Darger, a man who over the period of thirty years created a fantasy world within the confines of his studio apartment in Chicago. A janitor by day, Darger spent nearly all his free time creating a 15,000 page manuscript with accompanying illustrations, detailing the tribulations of the Vivian Girls, a group of pre-pubescent child laborers who rise against the Glandelinians, grown male soldiers who enslaved them.

In creating the film, Yu explains, "Part of the thrill about moving into Darger's world was feeling like an archeologist, trying to put pieces together, recreating the journey I had as a filmmaker." Yu and producer Susan West chose child actress Dakota Fanning as the film's narrator. Inventive sound design and animation enhance the fullness of scenes from the artist's fictitious world.

The film will open in Chicago on Friday, January 21st at the Music Box Theatre, 3733 North Southport Avenue. It is being distributed by Wellspring.